ENGLISH EDITION

In the next few days, EPATH (the BoG's Committee on Credit and Insurance Issues) will consider the plan to create a special scheme for the management of non-performing loans. This will be followed by an in-depth examination of the plan's technical aspects with BoG consultants, followed by presentations and discussions with investors and market players to test its operational aspects and the response of markets.

A move that is the first step in launching the tender for the concession of the facility, one of the many links in the ambitious plan to turn northern Greece into a strong regional energy hub, along with the Alexandroupolis FSRU and the TAP, IGB pipelines. In the underground infrastructure, it will be possible to store, in exchange for a price, of course, natural gas for a long time, a possibility that does not exist today in Greece, despite this being provided in many other European countries.

According to the Bank of Greece data, the net flow of business financing amounted to 1.86 billion euros in March, compared with a positive net flow of 462 million euros in February, with the annual rate of change increasing to 3.6 percent from 1.4 percent. Businesses in a healthy financial position and with a good credit profile rushed to boost their liquidity, by drawing liquidity from lenders. Additionally, banks have extended loan limits to healthy businesses to shield them from the effects of the crisis.

The bank's technocrats examined in detail all the alternatives for tackling the problem (maintaining the current strategy of loan securitizations, capital increases, bad bank, etc.) and concluded that creating a single bad bank achieves maximum efficiency, as it also achieves the largest reduction in non-performing loans per unit of capital.

He said that currently Greece has 1,017 beds in ICUs, 840 of them in public hospitals, 145 in private clinics and 32 in military hospitals. 352 of them are for COVID-19 patients.

On the other hand, he underlined that the "road tourism is not the best kind of tourism so, we would not like this year's tourism to be confine to this tourism".

According to the ministry, the Greek economy suffers a triple shock: one temporary but very strong shock in supply. A lockdown reduces production of goods and services, along with incomes of producers and labour force, a very strong shock in demand as a lockdown reduces consumption and third a very strong shock of uncertainty since both the duration and intensity of the phenomenon were unknown.

Participating in the online discussion organized by Tsomokos Digital was George Georgakopoulos, Intrum Hellas managing director, Theodoros Kalantonis, chairman of FPS, Fotis Kourmousis, Special Secretary for Private Debt Management, Panos Paleologos, founder and president of Hotel Brain and Giannis Chatzitheodosiou, head of the Athens chamber of tradesmen.

The government managed to respond to the unprecedented challenge we face with admirable reflexes: it made very difficult decisions when other major European countries failed to do so, minimizing human losses and keeping the health system afloat. This success has been recognized, after many years Greece is covered by the international press in a positive light and is mentioned as a model country in dealing with the current crisis. However, the state of the economy does not inspire any confidence.

During the emergency working conditions, banks managed in a very short time to transfer a large part of their operations online as more than a quarter of the administrative staff worked from home. According to sources, more than 10,000 laptops were handed out to employees from the four systemic banks.